Carlotta, who like most women took no interest in politics because it lacks "heart-interest," came to me with eyes swimming and cheeks aglow. She had just been reading about Burbank's heroism.
"Isn't he splendid!" she cried. "I always told you he'd be President. And you didn't believe me."
"Be patient with me, my dear," said I. "I am not a woman with seven-league boots of intuition. I'm only a heavy-footed man."
XIII
ROEBUCK & CO. PASS UNDER THE YOKE
And now the stage had been reached at which my ten mutinous clients could be, and must be, disciplined.
As a first step, I resigned the chairmanship of the state committee and ordered the election of Woodruff to the vacancy. I should soon have substituted Woodruff for myself, in any event. I had never wanted the place, and had taken it only because to refuse it would have been to throw away the golden opportunity Dunkirk so unexpectedly thrust at me. Holding that position, or any other officially connecting me with my party's machine, made me a target; and I wished to be completely hidden, for I wished the people of my state to think me merely one of the party servants, in sympathy with the rank and file rather than with the machine. Yet, in the chairmanship, in the targetship, I must have a man whom I could trust through and through; and, save Woodruff, who was there for the place?
When my resignation was announced, the independent and the opposition press congratulated me on my high principle in refusing to have any official connection with the machine responsible for such infamies. When Woodruff's election was announced it came as a complete surprise. Such of the newspapers as dared, and they were few, denounced it as infamy's crown of infamy; and the rank and file of the party was shocked,—as I had known it would be. He made not a murmur, but I knew what must be in his mind. I said nothing until six weeks or two months had passed; then I went straight at him.